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Showing posts with label windows 10. Show all posts
Showing posts with label windows 10. Show all posts

Thursday, 17 November 2016

Introduction

I have received a number of comments with regards to the procedure for dual booting Windows 10 and Ubuntu.

Some people have noticed that the free disk space they created is not available for use when they try and install Ubuntu.

This article aims to explain why you wouldn't be able to use the free space and who will be affected by this.

Who Is Affected?

If your computer uses the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) then you will not be affected. If however your computer has a legacy BIOS then you may be affected but only if your computer's hard drive already has 4 primary partitions.

How To Check Whether Your Computer Is Using UEFI Or A Legacy BIOS

As we are going to be using the Disk Management screen anyway the easiest way to check whether your computer is UEFI based or not is to right click on the start button and choose the "Disk Management" option from the menu.





















Look at the partitions for your hard disk (which will probably be disk 0). If you see a partition called "EFI System Partition" then you can feel very smug and stop reading this article because you will not be affected by the issue.

The Issue Explained


If there is no EFI partition then you could have issues with partitioning when installing Ubuntu.

The older style BIOS only allows a user to create 4 primary partitions on a disk whereas the newer GPT partitioning system allows more than you will ever need.

The problem with having just 4 partitions available is that Windows 10 often takes up a number of partitions itself. There is one for Windows and at least one for a recovery partition. The manufacturer of the computer quite often has a partition for its own recovery partition and then another partition may have been created for another reason.

As there can only be 4 primary partitions if you have shrunk the Windows partition the free space you have created cannot be placed in a partition and therefore cannot be used.

When you try to install Ubuntu you will not see an option to install alongside Windows and when you choose something else as an option you will see unusable space as shown below.






















The Solution

I can't give you a step by step solution to fix this as it depends entirely on what partitions are currently used on your system.

I can however tell you that all is not lost. 

Whilst you can only have 4 primary partitions you can split a single partition into a number of extended partitions. If you can free up one of the 4 primary partitions you can then create a number of logical/extended partitions on that single partition for installing Ubuntu.

How To Remove A Partition

Freeing up a single partition is the difficult bit.

If you have shrunk the Windows partition to free up space then you will want to delete the partition next to it (no, not the Windows one, probably the one to the right).

The issue is however, what are those partitions used for. If the partition is a Windows recovery partition then you could elect to move that partition to an external hard drive.


The partition might also be the recovery partition created by your computer's manufacturer. In this case you should find the software used by the manufacturer as this may allow you to backup the system to an external hard drive or USB drive which means you can delete the manufacturer's recovery partition and use it with the free space you created by shrinking Windows.

Another option is of course to use Macrium Reflect which I recommended as the backup tool as part of the process for dual booting Ubuntu and Windows 10. (Click here for that guide). You can use Macrium to create recovery media on DVDs, USB drives and external hard drives. With the recovery media safely stored externally you can safely delete the Windows recovery and manufacturer's recovery media.

If you have another partition called data then you might wish to move the data from there onto the Windows partition or indeed another drive such as an external hard drive and delete that partition.

You can delete a partition within the disk management tool by right clicking on it and choosing "delete volume".

Windows recovery partitions cannot be deleted using the disk management tool because the partition will be protected. This guide shows how to delete a protected partition.

It may be the case that the manufacturer's partition or Windows recovery partition is quite large and therefore you don't need the free space created by shrinking Windows any more. You can give the disk space you gained from shrinking Windows back to Windows by right clicking on the Windows partition in the disk management tool and choosing "Extend Volume". 

Given the choice between removing the Windows recovery partition and the manufacturers recovery partition I recommend removing the manufacturer's partition. I would however make sure that I had a viable recovery option available via Macrium reflect or another such tool.

The upshot is that you want to get to a position where you have only 3 primary partitions and then a section of free space on your computer large enough to install Ubuntu.

You should now be able to follow my guide to installing Ubuntu alongside Windows 10 to complete the task.

Summary

This only affects people who are using a computer with a legacy BIOS that already has 4 primary partitions in use.

To fix the issue remove one of the 4 primary partitions. 

Important: If you decide to remove a data partition make sure you have backed up the data first. If you decide to remove a recovery partition make sure you have created other recovery media

After deleting one of the 4 partitions you should be left with 3 primary partitions and an area of unallocated disk space.

When you run the Ubuntu installer you should now see the option to install alongside Windows 10.

If you do not get the option to install alongside Windows 10, choose the something else option as the installation type and create 2 extended partitions in the area of free space, the first taking up most of the disk space and mounted to root (/) and the second taking up around 8 gigabytes for swap space. The amount of swap space can be reduced or increased depending on the age of your machine and amount of memory available.





What To Do When Ubuntu Can't Use Free Unallocated Disk Space

Introduction

I have received a number of comments with regards to the procedure for dual booting Windows 10 and Ubuntu.

Some people have noticed that the free disk space they created is not available for use when they try and install Ubuntu.

This article aims to explain why you wouldn't be able to use the free space and who will be affected by this.

Who Is Affected?

If your computer uses the Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) then you will not be affected. If however your computer has a legacy BIOS then you may be affected but only if your computer's hard drive already has 4 primary partitions.

How To Check Whether Your Computer Is Using UEFI Or A Legacy BIOS

As we are going to be using the Disk Management screen anyway the easiest way to check whether your computer is UEFI based or not is to right click on the start button and choose the "Disk Management" option from the menu.





















Look at the partitions for your hard disk (which will probably be disk 0). If you see a partition called "EFI System Partition" then you can feel very smug and stop reading this article because you will not be affected by the issue.

The Issue Explained


If there is no EFI partition then you could have issues with partitioning when installing Ubuntu.

The older style BIOS only allows a user to create 4 primary partitions on a disk whereas the newer GPT partitioning system allows more than you will ever need.

The problem with having just 4 partitions available is that Windows 10 often takes up a number of partitions itself. There is one for Windows and at least one for a recovery partition. The manufacturer of the computer quite often has a partition for its own recovery partition and then another partition may have been created for another reason.

As there can only be 4 primary partitions if you have shrunk the Windows partition the free space you have created cannot be placed in a partition and therefore cannot be used.

When you try to install Ubuntu you will not see an option to install alongside Windows and when you choose something else as an option you will see unusable space as shown below.






















The Solution

I can't give you a step by step solution to fix this as it depends entirely on what partitions are currently used on your system.

I can however tell you that all is not lost. 

Whilst you can only have 4 primary partitions you can split a single partition into a number of extended partitions. If you can free up one of the 4 primary partitions you can then create a number of logical/extended partitions on that single partition for installing Ubuntu.

How To Remove A Partition

Freeing up a single partition is the difficult bit.

If you have shrunk the Windows partition to free up space then you will want to delete the partition next to it (no, not the Windows one, probably the one to the right).

The issue is however, what are those partitions used for. If the partition is a Windows recovery partition then you could elect to move that partition to an external hard drive.


The partition might also be the recovery partition created by your computer's manufacturer. In this case you should find the software used by the manufacturer as this may allow you to backup the system to an external hard drive or USB drive which means you can delete the manufacturer's recovery partition and use it with the free space you created by shrinking Windows.

Another option is of course to use Macrium Reflect which I recommended as the backup tool as part of the process for dual booting Ubuntu and Windows 10. (Click here for that guide). You can use Macrium to create recovery media on DVDs, USB drives and external hard drives. With the recovery media safely stored externally you can safely delete the Windows recovery and manufacturer's recovery media.

If you have another partition called data then you might wish to move the data from there onto the Windows partition or indeed another drive such as an external hard drive and delete that partition.

You can delete a partition within the disk management tool by right clicking on it and choosing "delete volume".

Windows recovery partitions cannot be deleted using the disk management tool because the partition will be protected. This guide shows how to delete a protected partition.

It may be the case that the manufacturer's partition or Windows recovery partition is quite large and therefore you don't need the free space created by shrinking Windows any more. You can give the disk space you gained from shrinking Windows back to Windows by right clicking on the Windows partition in the disk management tool and choosing "Extend Volume". 

Given the choice between removing the Windows recovery partition and the manufacturers recovery partition I recommend removing the manufacturer's partition. I would however make sure that I had a viable recovery option available via Macrium reflect or another such tool.

The upshot is that you want to get to a position where you have only 3 primary partitions and then a section of free space on your computer large enough to install Ubuntu.

You should now be able to follow my guide to installing Ubuntu alongside Windows 10 to complete the task.

Summary

This only affects people who are using a computer with a legacy BIOS that already has 4 primary partitions in use.

To fix the issue remove one of the 4 primary partitions. 

Important: If you decide to remove a data partition make sure you have backed up the data first. If you decide to remove a recovery partition make sure you have created other recovery media

After deleting one of the 4 partitions you should be left with 3 primary partitions and an area of unallocated disk space.

When you run the Ubuntu installer you should now see the option to install alongside Windows 10.

If you do not get the option to install alongside Windows 10, choose the something else option as the installation type and create 2 extended partitions in the area of free space, the first taking up most of the disk space and mounted to root (/) and the second taking up around 8 gigabytes for swap space. The amount of swap space can be reduced or increased depending on the age of your machine and amount of memory available.





6 comments
Posted at 20:07 |  by Gary Newell

Wednesday, 1 June 2016

Introduction


This time I am going to show you how to remove Ubuntu from a computer dual booting with Windows 10 with a standard boot loader.

Don't worry this isn't the start of me giving up on Linux. I am about to install another distribution and I want to get back to a clean setup similar to one you will have yourselves before writing a new guide.

The Steps

Create A Windows 10 Recovery Drive

It is a good idea to have a Windows 10 recovery drive whether you plan to remove Ubuntu or do anything else within Windows.

First things first, insert a blank USB drive.

In order to fix the boot record so that Ubuntu doesn't load anymore you will need a Windows 10 recovery drive.



Using the search bar at the bottom of the screen search for "Create a recovery drive" and when the option appears click on it.


Leave the back up system files box checked and click "Next".


Select the USB drive you wish to use as the recovery drive and click "Next".


Click "Create".

Fix The Master Boot Record

Restart the computer with the USB drive left plugged in to the computer.

A list of languages will appear. Choose the most appropriate one.



 A screen will appear with three options:


  • Continue
  • Troubleshoot
  • Turn off your PC
Choose "Troubleshoot"




The next screen asks whether you want to reset the PC or do something more advanced.

Choose "Advanced Options".


When the advanced options screen is displayed choose "Command Prompt".



Finally enter the following command:

bootrec.exe /fixmbr

Now restart the computer and remove the USB drive. 

Your computer will boot into Windows 10 without the option for booting into Ubuntu.

Delete The Ubuntu Partitions


Right click on the start button and choose "Disk Management".

As you can see from the screen above you will have a couple of Ubuntu partitions. You should hopefully recognise them because you created them when you installed Ubuntu in the first place.

There will be one healthy primary partition which is quite large and one which is much smaller. They will not have NTFS as the partition type.

Do not try and delete recovery partitions (although it won't let you anyway).


Right click on one of the partitions you need to delete and choose "Delete Volume".

When you are asked whether you are sure click "Yes".

Repeat the process for the second partition (assuming you have one and didn't just create one partition). Right click on the partition and select delete. Click "Yes" to approve.

If you have more than 2 Ubuntu partitions delete these as well.

You will be left with an area called "Free Space".

Right click on the "Free Space" and choose "Delete".


Right click on the partition immediately to the left of the free space and choose "Extend Volume".



Click "Next" when the extend Window Wizard appears.


All of the unallocated space will be selected by default. Click "Next" to extend Windows so that it uses the free space.


Summary

That is it. Your computer should now be as it was before you installed Ubuntu on it and you can use Windows 10 as you did previously.



How To Remove Ubuntu From A Dual Boot Windows 10 Computer With A Standard BIOS

Introduction


This time I am going to show you how to remove Ubuntu from a computer dual booting with Windows 10 with a standard boot loader.

Don't worry this isn't the start of me giving up on Linux. I am about to install another distribution and I want to get back to a clean setup similar to one you will have yourselves before writing a new guide.

The Steps

Create A Windows 10 Recovery Drive

It is a good idea to have a Windows 10 recovery drive whether you plan to remove Ubuntu or do anything else within Windows.

First things first, insert a blank USB drive.

In order to fix the boot record so that Ubuntu doesn't load anymore you will need a Windows 10 recovery drive.



Using the search bar at the bottom of the screen search for "Create a recovery drive" and when the option appears click on it.


Leave the back up system files box checked and click "Next".


Select the USB drive you wish to use as the recovery drive and click "Next".


Click "Create".

Fix The Master Boot Record

Restart the computer with the USB drive left plugged in to the computer.

A list of languages will appear. Choose the most appropriate one.



 A screen will appear with three options:


  • Continue
  • Troubleshoot
  • Turn off your PC
Choose "Troubleshoot"




The next screen asks whether you want to reset the PC or do something more advanced.

Choose "Advanced Options".


When the advanced options screen is displayed choose "Command Prompt".



Finally enter the following command:

bootrec.exe /fixmbr

Now restart the computer and remove the USB drive. 

Your computer will boot into Windows 10 without the option for booting into Ubuntu.

Delete The Ubuntu Partitions


Right click on the start button and choose "Disk Management".

As you can see from the screen above you will have a couple of Ubuntu partitions. You should hopefully recognise them because you created them when you installed Ubuntu in the first place.

There will be one healthy primary partition which is quite large and one which is much smaller. They will not have NTFS as the partition type.

Do not try and delete recovery partitions (although it won't let you anyway).


Right click on one of the partitions you need to delete and choose "Delete Volume".

When you are asked whether you are sure click "Yes".

Repeat the process for the second partition (assuming you have one and didn't just create one partition). Right click on the partition and select delete. Click "Yes" to approve.

If you have more than 2 Ubuntu partitions delete these as well.

You will be left with an area called "Free Space".

Right click on the "Free Space" and choose "Delete".


Right click on the partition immediately to the left of the free space and choose "Extend Volume".



Click "Next" when the extend Window Wizard appears.


All of the unallocated space will be selected by default. Click "Next" to extend Windows so that it uses the free space.


Summary

That is it. Your computer should now be as it was before you installed Ubuntu on it and you can use Windows 10 as you did previously.



8 comments
Posted at 20:53 |  by Gary Newell

Tuesday, 24 May 2016

Introduction

Many of the comments at the bottom of my guides for dual booting Windows 10 with Ubuntu relate to the use of SSDs.

In this guide I am going to show you how I dual booted Ubuntu and Windows 10 on my Lenovo Y700 Ideapad which contains a 128 gigabyte SSD and a 1 terabyte hard drive.

I have dedicated a whole new post for this guide as there is enough information to warrant it but there are links to other guides for areas that cross over.

Backup Your Computer

I always start with this option because you need to know that you can get back to where you started should something go awry.

Follow this guide which shows the safest way to back up Windows 10.

Create A Bootable Ubuntu USB Drive

In order to install Ubuntu you will need a bootable Ubuntu USB drive.



You can either follow this guide which shows how to create a USB drive using Win32 Disk Imager or you can .

Disk Management

This is where the major part of the guide differs from the previous one. 






















Right click on the start button and when the menu appears choose "Disk Management".






















The image above shows how the disks on my laptop were partitioned prior to me changing them.

Quite frankly they are ridiculous and I suspect other people who have bought laptops also have poorly thought out installations by the manufacturers.

Disk 0 represents the 128 gigabyte SSD and Disk 1 represents the 1 gigabyte hard drive.

So Why is this disk layout ridiculous?

The best performance you will get is when you are reading from the SSD. There are 2 recovery partitions installed on that very same SSD.

The whole point of recovery partitions is that they sit out of the way and are only read when you are up a creek without a paddle.

Therefore there is over 20 gigabytes of SSD totally wasted. There is also a recovery area on the hard drive which takes up over 70 gigabytes. 

I think it is sensible to have recovery partitions on the hard drive as although they waste space they are wasting space on the drive you want to use least.

I use Windows very infrequently so I don't need the Windows recovery partitions. I therefore decided to get rid of the Windows recovery partitions and keep the 1 gigabyte OEM partition and the recovery partition on the hard drive. This means I can always do a factory restore. (I have Windows 10 on a USB drive so there really isn't any need for me to keep this really either).























To remove the recovery partitions I opened an administrators command prompt by right clicking on the start button and choosing "Command Prompt (Admin)" from the menu.

The command line tool I used is called diskpart.

To run diskpart simply type diskpart into the command window.

You can view the disks on the computer by typing list disk.

From the image above you will see that disk 0 and disk 1 were returned.

The disk I wanted to work on was disk 0 which is the SSD. To select the disk you wish to amend type select disk n where n is the number of the disk.

To see the partitions on a disk type list partition.

As you can see I have 6 partitions listed. I wanted to remove partition 4 and partition 5 which were the recovery partitions.























To select a partition the command to use is select partition n where n is the number of the partition.

Normally to delete a partition all you have to do is type delete partition.

Recovery partitions are special though and are protected from deletion. You can force the deletion of the partition by typing delete partition override.












































The above image shows my disk after removing the recovery partitions.

Now 20 gigabytes is just about enough for Ubuntu but I wanted more so I reduced the size of the Windows partition as follows.






















To shrink a partition right click on it and choose "Shrink Volume" from the menu.


A window will appear and it will show you how much you can afford to shrink Windows by.  You can choose less than the amount specified but never more.

When you feel you have enough space click "Shrink". I went for the default option.























As you can see I now have nearly 60 gigabytes free for installing Ubuntu to on the SSD.

Power Options






















To be able to boot into Ubuntu you will need to adjust the power options so that your computer can boot from the USB drive.

Right click on the start button and choose "Power Options".





















From the menu click on the option "Choose what the power option does". 

At the top of the screen you will see a link with the words "Change settings that are currently unavailable".

Now scroll down and make sure the "Turn on fast startup" does not have tick in it. If it does click on it until it doesn't.

Click "Save Changes".

Boot Into Ubuntu Live






















To boot into Ubuntu hold down the shift key whilst logged into Windows. Reboot the computer whilst holding down the shift key.

A window will appear with UEFI boot settings. Choose to boot from an external device and choose boot from EFI device.

You should now boot into a live session of Ubuntu.

Install Ubuntu

If you want to be able to install updates during the installation click on the network icon in the top right corner and choose your wireless network. Enter the security key when requested. 

If you are happy to wait until after the installation before installing updates do not worry about connecting to the internet. 

If you have a poor internet connection I recommend not installing updates until after the installation has completed.






















Double click on the install icon on the desktop. The above welcome message should appear. 

Choose your installation language and click "Continue".




















If you haven't connected to the internet then the download updates option will be greyed out but if you have connected you can choose to download updates.

Also on this screen you can choose to install third party codecs which make it possible to play MP3 audio.

Note the option that says that you need to turn off secure boot to install the codecs. It is actually easier to not install codecs now and do it post installation whereby you won't have to do anything with secure boot.

Click "Continue".






Rather strangely I was asked whether I wanted to unmount the SSD before installing. I clicked "No" to this option.



















Normally at this stage I would say to choose the "Install Ubuntu alongside Windows Boot Manager" option but because I want to show how to partition the drive manually I suggest using the "Something Else" option. This allows you to specify where each partition is located.





















The next screen shows the layout of your disks. In my case there are partitions on /dev/sda and /dev/sdb.

What you are looking for is the free/unallocated space on /dev/sda which is the SSD and free/unallocated space on /dev/sdb which is the hard drive.

I chose to go for a full install of Ubuntu on the SSD as I will be using this regularly. I also decided to create a swap partition although with 16 gigabytes of RAM this is probably wasted disk space. I therefore put the swap partition on the hard drive.

To create a partition click on the free space on /dev/sda and press the plus symbol.



For the size I chose the whole of the space on the SSD. It is a primary partition and I want to use the beginning of the space (although it doesn't really matter because I am choosing all the space).

I chose EXT4 as the file system and / as the mount point. Clicking OK creates the partition and returns you to the disk layout screen.

With the SSD now completely allocated I moved on to the hard drive.

To create a swap partition I clicked on the free space on /dev/sdb and press the button with the plus symbol again.


I went for the full 16 gigabytes to match the amount of RAM in my machine. This is severely overkill but as I wasn't limited for disk space I went for it anyway.

Again I set the partition to primary but note that I chose to use the end of the space. In theory as this should be hardly used moving it to the end of the disk seems a sensible idea.

The only other thing to note is that I set the use as drop down list to "swap area". Clicking OK takes me back to the disk layout screen.

The rest of the hard drive is still an empty block of free space so what should I do with it?


I chose to create a 50 gigabyte FAT32 partition which gives me a nice area to share files between Linux and Windows without worrying about one not being overly happy with NTFS and the other not being at all happy with EXT4.



The rest I partitioned as a large block of space as an EXT4 partition. This is where I will store all of my larger files that I won't use regularly. Things like movies would fit well into this space.

Note that for these partitions I didn't choose a mount point. I did that later on in the Ubuntu disks tool as it is more user friendly.

With both of the disks now fully allocated I clicked the "Install Now" button. A message appears showing the partitions that will be created. Just continue past this screen.

The rest of the installation is fairly ordinary.

Select where you live by clicking on the map. This will set the time correctly on your computer.


Choose your keyboard layout by selecting the language in the left pane and the layout in the right pane.

Finally create a user. Enter your name and a name for your computer.

Then enter a user name and choose a password and repeat it. 

By default the setup requires you to log in every time you boot but you can get your computer to log in automatically by selecting the option but I don't recommend this.

Click "Continue".

The files will now be copied across and the system will be installed.


Finally you will be asked whether you want to continue testing or restart now. 

You can try rebooting and if the computer boots straight to Windows reinsert the USB drive and hold down the shift key and reboot back to the UEFI boot screen as you did before to get into the live version of Ubuntu.

Then follow this guide which shows how to use EFI Boot Manager to change the boot order.

Summary

When you have finished it is worth following this guide which shows 33 things to do after installing Ubuntu.

Also check out my new guide which shows how to show common applications such as Chrome, Dropbox and Steam easily in Ubuntu.

I am not saying my way is the only way to format the SSD and I welcome comments and suggestions in regards to this area.

The current layout is working well for me however.

Troubleshooting

If Ubuntu still will not boot after running EFI Boot Manager try reading this guide which aims to help with UEFI boot issues.

How To Dual Boot Ubuntu And Windows 10 Using An SSD

Introduction

Many of the comments at the bottom of my guides for dual booting Windows 10 with Ubuntu relate to the use of SSDs.

In this guide I am going to show you how I dual booted Ubuntu and Windows 10 on my Lenovo Y700 Ideapad which contains a 128 gigabyte SSD and a 1 terabyte hard drive.

I have dedicated a whole new post for this guide as there is enough information to warrant it but there are links to other guides for areas that cross over.

Backup Your Computer

I always start with this option because you need to know that you can get back to where you started should something go awry.

Follow this guide which shows the safest way to back up Windows 10.

Create A Bootable Ubuntu USB Drive

In order to install Ubuntu you will need a bootable Ubuntu USB drive.



You can either follow this guide which shows how to create a USB drive using Win32 Disk Imager or you can .

Disk Management

This is where the major part of the guide differs from the previous one. 






















Right click on the start button and when the menu appears choose "Disk Management".






















The image above shows how the disks on my laptop were partitioned prior to me changing them.

Quite frankly they are ridiculous and I suspect other people who have bought laptops also have poorly thought out installations by the manufacturers.

Disk 0 represents the 128 gigabyte SSD and Disk 1 represents the 1 gigabyte hard drive.

So Why is this disk layout ridiculous?

The best performance you will get is when you are reading from the SSD. There are 2 recovery partitions installed on that very same SSD.

The whole point of recovery partitions is that they sit out of the way and are only read when you are up a creek without a paddle.

Therefore there is over 20 gigabytes of SSD totally wasted. There is also a recovery area on the hard drive which takes up over 70 gigabytes. 

I think it is sensible to have recovery partitions on the hard drive as although they waste space they are wasting space on the drive you want to use least.

I use Windows very infrequently so I don't need the Windows recovery partitions. I therefore decided to get rid of the Windows recovery partitions and keep the 1 gigabyte OEM partition and the recovery partition on the hard drive. This means I can always do a factory restore. (I have Windows 10 on a USB drive so there really isn't any need for me to keep this really either).























To remove the recovery partitions I opened an administrators command prompt by right clicking on the start button and choosing "Command Prompt (Admin)" from the menu.

The command line tool I used is called diskpart.

To run diskpart simply type diskpart into the command window.

You can view the disks on the computer by typing list disk.

From the image above you will see that disk 0 and disk 1 were returned.

The disk I wanted to work on was disk 0 which is the SSD. To select the disk you wish to amend type select disk n where n is the number of the disk.

To see the partitions on a disk type list partition.

As you can see I have 6 partitions listed. I wanted to remove partition 4 and partition 5 which were the recovery partitions.























To select a partition the command to use is select partition n where n is the number of the partition.

Normally to delete a partition all you have to do is type delete partition.

Recovery partitions are special though and are protected from deletion. You can force the deletion of the partition by typing delete partition override.












































The above image shows my disk after removing the recovery partitions.

Now 20 gigabytes is just about enough for Ubuntu but I wanted more so I reduced the size of the Windows partition as follows.






















To shrink a partition right click on it and choose "Shrink Volume" from the menu.


A window will appear and it will show you how much you can afford to shrink Windows by.  You can choose less than the amount specified but never more.

When you feel you have enough space click "Shrink". I went for the default option.























As you can see I now have nearly 60 gigabytes free for installing Ubuntu to on the SSD.

Power Options






















To be able to boot into Ubuntu you will need to adjust the power options so that your computer can boot from the USB drive.

Right click on the start button and choose "Power Options".





















From the menu click on the option "Choose what the power option does". 

At the top of the screen you will see a link with the words "Change settings that are currently unavailable".

Now scroll down and make sure the "Turn on fast startup" does not have tick in it. If it does click on it until it doesn't.

Click "Save Changes".

Boot Into Ubuntu Live






















To boot into Ubuntu hold down the shift key whilst logged into Windows. Reboot the computer whilst holding down the shift key.

A window will appear with UEFI boot settings. Choose to boot from an external device and choose boot from EFI device.

You should now boot into a live session of Ubuntu.

Install Ubuntu

If you want to be able to install updates during the installation click on the network icon in the top right corner and choose your wireless network. Enter the security key when requested. 

If you are happy to wait until after the installation before installing updates do not worry about connecting to the internet. 

If you have a poor internet connection I recommend not installing updates until after the installation has completed.






















Double click on the install icon on the desktop. The above welcome message should appear. 

Choose your installation language and click "Continue".




















If you haven't connected to the internet then the download updates option will be greyed out but if you have connected you can choose to download updates.

Also on this screen you can choose to install third party codecs which make it possible to play MP3 audio.

Note the option that says that you need to turn off secure boot to install the codecs. It is actually easier to not install codecs now and do it post installation whereby you won't have to do anything with secure boot.

Click "Continue".






Rather strangely I was asked whether I wanted to unmount the SSD before installing. I clicked "No" to this option.



















Normally at this stage I would say to choose the "Install Ubuntu alongside Windows Boot Manager" option but because I want to show how to partition the drive manually I suggest using the "Something Else" option. This allows you to specify where each partition is located.





















The next screen shows the layout of your disks. In my case there are partitions on /dev/sda and /dev/sdb.

What you are looking for is the free/unallocated space on /dev/sda which is the SSD and free/unallocated space on /dev/sdb which is the hard drive.

I chose to go for a full install of Ubuntu on the SSD as I will be using this regularly. I also decided to create a swap partition although with 16 gigabytes of RAM this is probably wasted disk space. I therefore put the swap partition on the hard drive.

To create a partition click on the free space on /dev/sda and press the plus symbol.



For the size I chose the whole of the space on the SSD. It is a primary partition and I want to use the beginning of the space (although it doesn't really matter because I am choosing all the space).

I chose EXT4 as the file system and / as the mount point. Clicking OK creates the partition and returns you to the disk layout screen.

With the SSD now completely allocated I moved on to the hard drive.

To create a swap partition I clicked on the free space on /dev/sdb and press the button with the plus symbol again.


I went for the full 16 gigabytes to match the amount of RAM in my machine. This is severely overkill but as I wasn't limited for disk space I went for it anyway.

Again I set the partition to primary but note that I chose to use the end of the space. In theory as this should be hardly used moving it to the end of the disk seems a sensible idea.

The only other thing to note is that I set the use as drop down list to "swap area". Clicking OK takes me back to the disk layout screen.

The rest of the hard drive is still an empty block of free space so what should I do with it?


I chose to create a 50 gigabyte FAT32 partition which gives me a nice area to share files between Linux and Windows without worrying about one not being overly happy with NTFS and the other not being at all happy with EXT4.



The rest I partitioned as a large block of space as an EXT4 partition. This is where I will store all of my larger files that I won't use regularly. Things like movies would fit well into this space.

Note that for these partitions I didn't choose a mount point. I did that later on in the Ubuntu disks tool as it is more user friendly.

With both of the disks now fully allocated I clicked the "Install Now" button. A message appears showing the partitions that will be created. Just continue past this screen.

The rest of the installation is fairly ordinary.

Select where you live by clicking on the map. This will set the time correctly on your computer.


Choose your keyboard layout by selecting the language in the left pane and the layout in the right pane.

Finally create a user. Enter your name and a name for your computer.

Then enter a user name and choose a password and repeat it. 

By default the setup requires you to log in every time you boot but you can get your computer to log in automatically by selecting the option but I don't recommend this.

Click "Continue".

The files will now be copied across and the system will be installed.


Finally you will be asked whether you want to continue testing or restart now. 

You can try rebooting and if the computer boots straight to Windows reinsert the USB drive and hold down the shift key and reboot back to the UEFI boot screen as you did before to get into the live version of Ubuntu.

Then follow this guide which shows how to use EFI Boot Manager to change the boot order.

Summary

When you have finished it is worth following this guide which shows 33 things to do after installing Ubuntu.

Also check out my new guide which shows how to show common applications such as Chrome, Dropbox and Steam easily in Ubuntu.

I am not saying my way is the only way to format the SSD and I welcome comments and suggestions in regards to this area.

The current layout is working well for me however.

Troubleshooting

If Ubuntu still will not boot after running EFI Boot Manager try reading this guide which aims to help with UEFI boot issues.

24 comments
Posted at 19:28 |  by Gary Newell

Thursday, 28 April 2016

Introduction

Updated For Linux Mint 18
The most popular guides on this website deal with dual booting Ubuntu and Windows. In fact I have written a whole heap of guides showing how to dual boot various systems as shown by the list below.

Some of these links will take you to About.com:


What You Will Need

You will need:
  • a blank USB drive
  • media to back up your current system to (i.e. external hard drive, blank DVDs, large USB drive)
  • an internet connection
  • time
The time it takes to install Linux Mint alongside Windows 10 depends on how fast your internet connection is as you will need to download an ISO file which is around 2 gigabytes in size.

The actual installation will take around 30 to 45 minutes and this includes the time it takes to create the bootable USB drive. (It doesn't include the time it takes to backup your machine).

Backup Your Computer

This is the most important step during the whole procedure. It is a little bit time consuming and you will need a device to backup your computer to but the benefits totally outweigh the cons.

With a good backup you can get straight back to the point you were in prior to following this guide.

This will save you money should you accidentally kill Windows and lose your recovery partition. 

Consider the backup as your insurance policy.


Shrink Your Windows Partition

In order to install Linux Mint alongside Windows 10 you need to make some space available on your hard drive.

Traditionally Windows installations take up a vast amount of disk space. You can safely shrink the Windows partition leaving enough space for both Windows 10 and Linux Mint.


This is a very important step. Do not skip it.

Create A Linux Mint USB Drive

The following guide shows some very important steps in the dual booting process:
  • how to download Linux Mint
  • how to format a USB drive
  • how to create the Linux Mint USB drive
  • how to change the boot settings to allow booting into Linux Mint live
  • how to actually boot into Linux Mint live

Follow the linked guide and from within Linux Mint live follow the rest of the guide

Install Linux Mint


























Click on the install icon on the desktop.

The installer will start and you will be asked to choose your installation language. 

Now personally I would choose the language that you are most fluent in otherwise you are really setting yourself an extra challenge.


























If you have followed my guides for installing Ubuntu then most of these steps will be familiar to you but there are some subtle differences which I will come to shortly with regards to partitioning.

Linux Mint no longer asks you to connect to the internet and it doesn't ask whether you want to update your system during the installation.

You are however still asked whether you want to install third party software for graphics and WI-FI hardware, Flash, MP3 and other media.

I recommend checking this box especially if you have a modern computer as it will help to get your wireless and graphics cards working to their optimum.

Check the box and click "Continue".


























Another screen was removed from the installer. It used to provide a screen showing how prepared you are for installing Linux Mint.

It was a fairly pointless screen because the options were as follows:


  • check your computer is plugged in
  • check your computer is connected to the internet
  • check your computer has enough disk space. (minimum 9.4 gigabytes)
The reason the screen was largely pointless is that you don't need to be plugged in if your computer happens to be a laptop which has enough battery power.

You didn't need to be connected to the internet to install Linux Mint.

Finally you needed realistically a lot more than 9.4 gigabytes of hard drive space. In reality a minimum of 20 gigabytes.

So that has gone and instead you move straight to the installation type screen.

I have received a number of comments on the Ubuntu dual boot guide stating that there is no option to install alongside Windows 10.

Previously whilst trying to dual boot Linux Mint with Windows 10 on this computer there was no option to install alongside Windows. It only came with the option to erase the disk or to do something else. All fairly scary stuff.

In Linux Mint 18 the installer does indeed show the "Install alongside Windows 10 boot manager".

If you get the install alongside Windows 10 boot manager, choose that option and click install now. Now skip to the section with the title "Confirm Changes To Disk".

How To Setup Using The Something Else Option

If you don't get the option to install alongside Windows 10 click on "Something Else".
































You will now see a screen which shows your current disk layout. You will also see that I have highlighted a section of free space.

The first thing to check is the drop down list at the bottom of the screen. Make sure it points to the partition with type EFI listed in the table above.

The free space was created by shrinking Windows in a previous step. If you don't see a section of free space, stop what you are doing and revisit the steps for shrinking Windows.

With the free space line highlighted click on the plus symbol.


For this installation I am going to show you how to create 2 partitions. The first is the root partition and is where Linux Mint will be installed and the second will be the swap partition.

The create partition screen shows the amount of free space in megabytes. 

You need to take away the amount of memory your computer has in gigabytes away from the size shown on your screen.

Note that the size is shown in megabytes so you will need to convert from gigabytes to megabytes. This may sound confusing but if your computer has 4 gigabytes of RAM then you need to take 4000 away from the figure in the size box, if you have 8 gigabytes of RAM then you need to take 8000 away from the figure in the size box.

Make sure the type for the new partition is set to primary, set the location to the beginning of this space, select "EXT4" as the use as and change the mount point to a forward slash (/).

You are basically creating a new primary partition with the EXT4 file system and setting the mount point to root.

Click "OK" to continue.































The partitioning screen will be displayed again. You should now see the new partition that you created in the previous step and there will still be free space.

Click on the free space and click the plus symbol again.


This time you will be creating a swap partition.

Leave the size as the number displayed (i.e use the rest of the free space).

Set the type to primary and leave the location as the beginning of the free space.

Select "swap area" as the option for use as.

Press "OK".

When you get back to the installation type screen click "Install"

Confirm Changes To Disk



A window will appear showing which partitions will be created.

Click "Continue".

Other Installation Settings



























You will be pleased to know that the scary bit is now out of the way.

Click where you live on the map. This is used to set your timezone.

Click "Continue".



























Choose your keyboard layout by selecting the language of the keyboard from the left pane and then the keyboard type from the right pane. Generally these are set for you already.

Click "Continue".



























The final step is to create a user.

Enter your name and give your computer a name. The computer name is how it will appear on a home network.

Choose a user name and then choose a password. You will need to confirm the password.

You can choose to login automatically but I highly recommend that you don't do this. The default option is to require a password to login which is far more sensible.

The final box allows you to encrypt your home folder. You can do this to keep your important documents safe should your computer fall into the wrong hands (i.e. thieves). However if you lose the encryption key then you won't be able to access your documents yourself. It is up to you whether you tick this box or not.

Click "Continue".








The installer will now start copying the files and installing them to your computer. When the process has completed you will receive the option to restart now or continue testing.

You can now restart your computer making sure that you remove the USB drive after the computer has shut down.

When the computer restarts you will receive a new menu with options to boot into Linux Mint or to boot into Windows Boot Manager.

Try the Linux Mint option to make sure it works and then try the Windows option to make sure it works.

Troubleshooting

If your computer boots straight back to Windows boot back into the live environment and use the following guide to set the correct UEFI boot order.

The NVidia graphics issues which I reported previously have been fixed in Linux Mint 18 due to the more modern kernel.

On modern computers with the latest Intel wireless adapters you might find that you can't get a wireless connection. Another guide is on its way showing how to fix this issue.


But Gary.... It boots straight to Windows!!!!

If Linux Mint still will not boot after running EFI Boot Manager try reading this guide which aims to help with UEFI boot issues.

How To Install Linux Mint 18 Alongside Windows 10 (UEFI)

Introduction

Updated For Linux Mint 18
The most popular guides on this website deal with dual booting Ubuntu and Windows. In fact I have written a whole heap of guides showing how to dual boot various systems as shown by the list below.

Some of these links will take you to About.com:


What You Will Need

You will need:
  • a blank USB drive
  • media to back up your current system to (i.e. external hard drive, blank DVDs, large USB drive)
  • an internet connection
  • time
The time it takes to install Linux Mint alongside Windows 10 depends on how fast your internet connection is as you will need to download an ISO file which is around 2 gigabytes in size.

The actual installation will take around 30 to 45 minutes and this includes the time it takes to create the bootable USB drive. (It doesn't include the time it takes to backup your machine).

Backup Your Computer

This is the most important step during the whole procedure. It is a little bit time consuming and you will need a device to backup your computer to but the benefits totally outweigh the cons.

With a good backup you can get straight back to the point you were in prior to following this guide.

This will save you money should you accidentally kill Windows and lose your recovery partition. 

Consider the backup as your insurance policy.


Shrink Your Windows Partition

In order to install Linux Mint alongside Windows 10 you need to make some space available on your hard drive.

Traditionally Windows installations take up a vast amount of disk space. You can safely shrink the Windows partition leaving enough space for both Windows 10 and Linux Mint.


This is a very important step. Do not skip it.

Create A Linux Mint USB Drive

The following guide shows some very important steps in the dual booting process:
  • how to download Linux Mint
  • how to format a USB drive
  • how to create the Linux Mint USB drive
  • how to change the boot settings to allow booting into Linux Mint live
  • how to actually boot into Linux Mint live

Follow the linked guide and from within Linux Mint live follow the rest of the guide

Install Linux Mint


























Click on the install icon on the desktop.

The installer will start and you will be asked to choose your installation language. 

Now personally I would choose the language that you are most fluent in otherwise you are really setting yourself an extra challenge.


























If you have followed my guides for installing Ubuntu then most of these steps will be familiar to you but there are some subtle differences which I will come to shortly with regards to partitioning.

Linux Mint no longer asks you to connect to the internet and it doesn't ask whether you want to update your system during the installation.

You are however still asked whether you want to install third party software for graphics and WI-FI hardware, Flash, MP3 and other media.

I recommend checking this box especially if you have a modern computer as it will help to get your wireless and graphics cards working to their optimum.

Check the box and click "Continue".


























Another screen was removed from the installer. It used to provide a screen showing how prepared you are for installing Linux Mint.

It was a fairly pointless screen because the options were as follows:


  • check your computer is plugged in
  • check your computer is connected to the internet
  • check your computer has enough disk space. (minimum 9.4 gigabytes)
The reason the screen was largely pointless is that you don't need to be plugged in if your computer happens to be a laptop which has enough battery power.

You didn't need to be connected to the internet to install Linux Mint.

Finally you needed realistically a lot more than 9.4 gigabytes of hard drive space. In reality a minimum of 20 gigabytes.

So that has gone and instead you move straight to the installation type screen.

I have received a number of comments on the Ubuntu dual boot guide stating that there is no option to install alongside Windows 10.

Previously whilst trying to dual boot Linux Mint with Windows 10 on this computer there was no option to install alongside Windows. It only came with the option to erase the disk or to do something else. All fairly scary stuff.

In Linux Mint 18 the installer does indeed show the "Install alongside Windows 10 boot manager".

If you get the install alongside Windows 10 boot manager, choose that option and click install now. Now skip to the section with the title "Confirm Changes To Disk".

How To Setup Using The Something Else Option

If you don't get the option to install alongside Windows 10 click on "Something Else".
































You will now see a screen which shows your current disk layout. You will also see that I have highlighted a section of free space.

The first thing to check is the drop down list at the bottom of the screen. Make sure it points to the partition with type EFI listed in the table above.

The free space was created by shrinking Windows in a previous step. If you don't see a section of free space, stop what you are doing and revisit the steps for shrinking Windows.

With the free space line highlighted click on the plus symbol.


For this installation I am going to show you how to create 2 partitions. The first is the root partition and is where Linux Mint will be installed and the second will be the swap partition.

The create partition screen shows the amount of free space in megabytes. 

You need to take away the amount of memory your computer has in gigabytes away from the size shown on your screen.

Note that the size is shown in megabytes so you will need to convert from gigabytes to megabytes. This may sound confusing but if your computer has 4 gigabytes of RAM then you need to take 4000 away from the figure in the size box, if you have 8 gigabytes of RAM then you need to take 8000 away from the figure in the size box.

Make sure the type for the new partition is set to primary, set the location to the beginning of this space, select "EXT4" as the use as and change the mount point to a forward slash (/).

You are basically creating a new primary partition with the EXT4 file system and setting the mount point to root.

Click "OK" to continue.































The partitioning screen will be displayed again. You should now see the new partition that you created in the previous step and there will still be free space.

Click on the free space and click the plus symbol again.


This time you will be creating a swap partition.

Leave the size as the number displayed (i.e use the rest of the free space).

Set the type to primary and leave the location as the beginning of the free space.

Select "swap area" as the option for use as.

Press "OK".

When you get back to the installation type screen click "Install"

Confirm Changes To Disk



A window will appear showing which partitions will be created.

Click "Continue".

Other Installation Settings



























You will be pleased to know that the scary bit is now out of the way.

Click where you live on the map. This is used to set your timezone.

Click "Continue".



























Choose your keyboard layout by selecting the language of the keyboard from the left pane and then the keyboard type from the right pane. Generally these are set for you already.

Click "Continue".



























The final step is to create a user.

Enter your name and give your computer a name. The computer name is how it will appear on a home network.

Choose a user name and then choose a password. You will need to confirm the password.

You can choose to login automatically but I highly recommend that you don't do this. The default option is to require a password to login which is far more sensible.

The final box allows you to encrypt your home folder. You can do this to keep your important documents safe should your computer fall into the wrong hands (i.e. thieves). However if you lose the encryption key then you won't be able to access your documents yourself. It is up to you whether you tick this box or not.

Click "Continue".








The installer will now start copying the files and installing them to your computer. When the process has completed you will receive the option to restart now or continue testing.

You can now restart your computer making sure that you remove the USB drive after the computer has shut down.

When the computer restarts you will receive a new menu with options to boot into Linux Mint or to boot into Windows Boot Manager.

Try the Linux Mint option to make sure it works and then try the Windows option to make sure it works.

Troubleshooting

If your computer boots straight back to Windows boot back into the live environment and use the following guide to set the correct UEFI boot order.

The NVidia graphics issues which I reported previously have been fixed in Linux Mint 18 due to the more modern kernel.

On modern computers with the latest Intel wireless adapters you might find that you can't get a wireless connection. Another guide is on its way showing how to fix this issue.


But Gary.... It boots straight to Windows!!!!

If Linux Mint still will not boot after running EFI Boot Manager try reading this guide which aims to help with UEFI boot issues.

13 comments
Posted at 19:29 |  by Gary Newell
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